The New Jersey Transit Authority immediately suspended all service in both directions that passes through the Hoboken station as paramedics rushed to the wreckage to gauge just how many people were wounded.

According to Bhagyesh Shah, a passenger who was riding on the train when the accident happened, the train smashed through a number of the station's pillars as it plowed into the station, causing parts of the station's roof to fall down and batter the train. Shah and others who were riding in the second train car were able to push their way out using the emergency window exits.

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"It was for a couple seconds, but it felt like an eternity," Shah told NBC. "I saw a woman pinned under the concrete. A lot of people were bleeding, one guy was crying."

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In an interview with Reuters, Linda Albelli, a 62-year-old woman sitting in one of the train's cars farther back, it was apparent to everyone on the train that something was wrong judging by how fast it entered the station.

"I noticed, 'he's not slowing up, we're going too fast,' and with that there was this tremendous crash," Albelli recalled. "There was just so much, a lot of people in need of attention," she said.